Take A Breath (And Let The Rest Come Easy)
by Aerotes
Summary: War is never ending, but Daryl's girls are with him to help him through it. (Or the one where Daryl gets injured and he's ready to give up) [An AU addition to the 'You & I (We'll Face The World Together)' verse]


He's somewhere in the Middle East, he's not really sure where, but he's there. The sound of battles rages on, their gunshots echoed by dying screams, and the air is tainted by the blood of friends and foes. Nausea rocks him, and the experience leaves him feel like his chest is like a balloon with a hole in it that he's desperately trying to inflate.

He wants to go home.

He hates this, hates it so much. He hates being away from home, and he hates the Government. He hates conscription, and he hates this fucking war. He wants to go home to safety. To comfort. To Beth and Stephanie Jane.

Except he can't.

It's been three months (or has it been four? He doesn't know anymore.), and he's not quite sure how many weeks or how many days it's been since he was forced to enlist, since he had to start fighting again, since he had to leave behind his wife and daughter. It's been far too long since he's seen Beth or since he's wrapped his arms around Beth.

He hates this fucking war.

His hands tighten around the gun, squeezing the trigger but the clip is empty, clicking uselessly in his hand. He's out of ammo, he realises, though he squeezes the trigger a few more times just to make sure. He shoves it back in his holster and grabs his knife and wishes all the world he was back at home, drinking hot chocolate and watching shitty cartoons with his girls and not in a battlefield, where the air tastes bitter and stings his nose, where his soul is once again tainted with death and the light that Stephanie Jane and Beth left was dimming.

He wishes he was back in the trenches at the very least, and not making daring attempts towards the enemy. He doesn't want to die, not in this god forsaken land, and he doesn't want to leave Beth and Stephanie Jane behind, as a widow and fatherless respectively. He left them behind with Merle, but he's not entirely sure how long he's going to stick around, or how good of a job he doing. As much as he loves Merle, he doesn't want his brother around Beth and Stephanie Jane. He doesn't want them to be tainted by Merle's bad influences. He doesn't want their bright souls to be compromised by Merle's murky one.

"DIXON, TO YOUR LEFT." A voice mumbles to his right, but it's not a mumble, it's a desperate scream ripping from someone's throat, but his hearing isn't so great out here, the whistling and rattling of bullets and the broken cries from the injured and dying that can't be saved. He throws himself to the right, shoulder hitting against the unforgiving hard ground littered with sharp stones and painted with blood. It jars, and rocks dig painfully into his flesh, the breath ripped away from his body (and he's reminded that though he feels like he can't breathe, he still needs oxygen). He would cry out, but his throat protests at any attempts at noise.

In moments, hands are on his arm and pulling him to his feet. His shoulder screams and he still can't draw in air, his chest burns like there's acid melting his lungs. He tries to bring in air, but any attempts are pitiful gasps that are like sand rubbing his throat raw.

"It's alright, Daryl, I gotcha." A voice murmurs to him, calm and reassuring against the sound of the battle. "We'll get you fixed up real good in no time." He feels detached, the words not quite registering. The battlefield is real, but he can't focus on it, it feels like a blurry photograph that won't properly adjust.

"Daryl!" The voice cries, no longer calm. The hand moves to his face, grasping his jaw and forcing him to look at the owner of the voice. Daryl tries to see the person, but his eyes won't listen to his brain. "Daryl, come on, I need ya to look at me."

"Rick?" He murmurs softly, voice cracking and breaking under the strain of trying to talk. His lungs feel all but useless now, and he thinks if he could see them now, they'd be eroded and blackened, like a smoker's would. Every attempt at breathing drags against the walls of his throat, cutting at them, like he's breathing razor blades instead of air. He wonders if he'll die soon, if his lungs will kill him, or if the razor blades with fill his throat will blood and he'll drown it.

"Yeah, it's me. You'll be alright, just stay with me." Daryl murmurs softly in agreement, but his vision isn't great right now, blackened and shaky. He can't really see Rick anymore, just the shape of the former cop. He wonders if Rick feels the same as Daryl does, if he worries about leaving his wife and child behind in the hands of Shane. "Come on man, I need you to try. Can you walk?"

It's a stupid fucking question, Daryl's been walking since he's been a toddler. Of course he knows how to walk, but he tries to take a step and he falters, legs shaking and giving way. He hates himself for it, he knows how to walk, and it's the most basic function that he's never had to think about, but then again, he's never had to think about breathing either, but that was before it felt like he was trying to breathe glass.

"Shit, you're not doin' so great, are you?" Rick breathes, but Daryl can't quite hear him. He focuses on trying to step forward, but it's useless. His legs are stiff and useless, like the legs on a Barbie doll. They're there, he knows that. He can see them and feel them - they ache something awful, but they're not working. He doesn't know why, his legs aren't broken.

Rick grasps him tighter and drags him, grunting under the other man's weight. "Please, Daryl. Just hold on." Daryl tries to speak, and he lets out a rasping cry that makes Rick pause. "Shit. Are you okay?"

"Rick." He tries again, voice weak and hardly audible over the gunshots. He wants to tell Rick to go and run, to go find safety and to just leave Daryl behind. Daryl knows he's going to die out here, on the dirty ground and sweltering heat that leaves blisters marring him skin, surrounded by bullets and death. "Go." He says. Swallowing feels like there's ash in his throat, burning away at the flesh.

Rick shakes his head. "I'm not leaving you." He says, in that no-nonsense tone. "Don't be stupid."

He wants to tell Rick that he's the one being stupid, but then Rick says; "Think about Beth. Think about Stephanie Jane. You can't leave them behind."

Beth and Stephanie Jane. His two girls, and the two lights that led him out of the darkness. They hadn't given up on him, and he wouldn't give up on them. Stephanie Jane, with her light brown hair and beautiful eyes like topazes, gorgeous and only seven years old was far too young to lose her father because of some stupid fucking war. And Beth, his wife who had stood by him, through his worse times, and who had held his hand, her soul so bright and shining while his was shadowed, but she'd never minded. She had been the one that talked him softly at three am in the morning, never in an impatient tone, and she'd never push him to tell him about his nightmares.

Daryl doesn't sleep well without her at his side, in fact, he's not sure that he's slept at all, because it sure as hell doesn't feel like it.

"Get me away from here." He said, his voice a raspy growl. "I want to go home." He feels stronger at the mere thought of his girls but his legs still won't work, but he tries. Rick stays by his side, taking him to safety in a makeshift trench.

Daryl still can't breathe though, but he tries, he fucking tries. Debris of war creates a turmoil inside of his chest, and it feels like his lungs are splintering and breaking apart, tightening and grabbing at his throat so air doesn't reach them, and he feels like he's a child again, with a chest infection and caught out in the cold storm because his dad was a fucking asshole that didn't care for him all that well (though, Daryl has a few faint memories of the man _trying _to be a good father before he gave up because of the grief).

"You'll make it through this Daryl. For them." Rick tells him reassuringly.

_For them._ Daryl think to himself. _For them. For them. For them. _

And suddenly, breathing feels somewhat easier.


End file.
